


Under the Auspice of the Empire

by engmaresh



Series: Baavira Week/end [4]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Alternate Universe - Royalty, Arranged Marriage, Drama, Drunk Sex, F/M, Humor, Identity Porn, Light Angst, Mild Language, Mildly Dubious Consent, Romance, Sexual Content, Strangers to Lovers, Tropes, baavira week, tags to be added as they come
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-06-26
Packaged: 2020-05-20 07:27:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19372054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/engmaresh/pseuds/engmaresh
Summary: When Zaofu comes under threat from the Empire, Baatar finds himself arranged to marry the mysterious Great Uniter, who has been cutting a swath through the fallen Earth Kingdom, and whose troops now lie encamped at Zaofu's door.Meanwhile, the effort of uniting the fallen states has nearly driven the Earth Empire into bankruptcy. To secure the alliance of the wealthy and technologically advanced nation of Zaofu, Kuvira has to marry their eldest prince.Neither of them want this, but sacrifices have to be made...





	Under the Auspice of the Empire

**Author's Note:**

> This ended up being more an arranged marriage AU than a royalty one, though they're all still ruling class.
> 
>  **Note:** Though the fic as a whole is mature, there is an explicit sex scene somewhere after the midpoint of the fic. It is also, by nature of the identity issues and drunk sex tropes involved, mildly dub-con.

"What do you mean, this is the only way? Have you even tried anything else?"

"Please Junior," said Suyin, closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose. "Don't make harder than it already is."

"Me, making it hard for you?" yelled Baatar. The strong desire to hit something, break something surged through him, so he crossed his arms tightly over his chest. "I'm the one who's being married off here!"

"I'm so sorry, Junior, you know I am," said Suyin imploringly. She sounded close to tears, and it tightened the knot that had been building in Baatar's chest since their conversation had begun. "Believe me when I said I did everything I could. But in the end–"

"It is my duty," he finished hollowly.

"I really wish they'd accepted something else."

"But not someone." The bitter words tripped off his tongue before he could hold them in. "I am the most–"

He managed to cut off the rest at the devastated look that crossed his mother's face. "Fine, fine. Like I'll let you do that to Huan or Opal anyway."

"But not the twins?" Suyin asked with a watery chuckle.

"Offering Wing or Wei up for marriage would be tantamount to declaring war, everyone knows that," said Baatar, voice as dry as he could manage past the tightness in his chest. "Here." He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and offered it to his mother. She took it with a grateful smile, dabbing at her tear-rimmed eyes.

"You are a good son," she said, cupping a hand to his cheek. He blinked, and some of the tears he'd tried to hold back slipped down his face. Suyin brushed them away with her thumb. "I love you so much."

"Mom," he began, hating how his voice cracked. "I–I–"

"Oh sweetie," she said, pulling him close. It never stopped surprising him how much shorter she was than him now, that he could no longer bury his face in her neck and hide from the world. But his mother still gave the best hugs, and he relished the feeling of safety in her arms, made all the more bittersweet by the knowledge of the treaty she'd made to save Zaofu. To save his people. He was doing this for his people.

"Baatar," his mother said softly, stroking her hand through his hair. "You know I'll never let anything happen to you, right?"

Except this? he wanted to ask, but refrained, knowing it was petty and needlessly hurtful. A diplomatic marriage of necessity had always been a possibility for him, especially when he'd shown no inclination of his own to settle down. Still, Baatar had never expected it to actually happen.

"When's the wedding?" he asked, finally pulling out of her embrace, grateful his voice was steady.

"The wedding is in three days," said Suyin. "The tea ceremony is right after"

Baatar dragged a hand down his face. "Wow, they just couldn't wait, could they?"

"The Great Uniter wishes to formalize the treaty as soon as possible," his mother explained apologetically. "Three days give us enough time for us to make an announcement and prepare for the ceremony."

"Great," said Baatar, voice biting to hide that it was threatening to crack again. "Three days. I'm just going to go–" He gestured listlessly at the door.

"Don't go too far."

"I'm not going to run away!" he shouted, though the tempting thought had briefly crossed his mind. "I just...need some space."

"I understand," his mother said gently. She took his hand and squeezed it briefly. "Take all the time you need."

 

* * *

 

"All the time you need" turned out to be twenty-four hours. After that brief period that Baatar spent mostly sleeping and drinking, he found himself dragged out of his rooms, still hungover and reeking, to be primped out for his new spouse. Huan went with him, and while Baatar was grateful for the company of his younger brother, he decided against asking if their mother had put him up to it.

"I don't even know why she'd care either way what my hair looks like," he grumbled to Huan as his stylist draped a cape about his shoulders. "Didn't she get a picture of me?"

"You _could_ use some tidying up," offered the stylist, brandishing a pair of clippers.

"I wasn't asking your opinion," Baatar snapped.

"I don't know," said Huan, shrugging. He ran his thumbnail over the teeth of a comb, the sound setting Baatar further on edge. "It seems to be the style among her soldiers, maybe she likes her men that way."

"Great," Baatar ground out, closing his eyes to the hum of the clippers and the cold touch of metal to the nape of his neck. "Turns out I'm not just being married off, but actually prostituted out to some crazy warlord who makes all her soldiers wear the same haircut."

"Her people seem to like her," said Huan. "I've been reading through her policies and reforms, especially those in Ba Sing Se and–"

"Ugh, stop trying to sell this to me."

"I'm just trying to make you feel better," protested Huan.

"Maybe you can fucking marry her then," Baatar snarled. He opened his eyes briefly to glare at his younger brother, closing them in a hurry when he caught sight of his reflection in the mirror.

"You know I can't–"

"Nice that mom apparently took sexuality into account."

"You know she didn't–"

"Dammit, Huan. Yes, I know she didn't." He dug his nails into the armrest of the chair, as the clippers starting running up his sideburns.

"You don't have to be such an asshole," Huan muttered. _Creak, creak_ went his thumbnail over the comb.

"I'm being married off to a woman I've never met in order to avoid a war between our country and her new empire. I can be an asshole as much as I want."

"I heard that's not a very attractive quality in a spouse."

"Good," Baatar grumbled. "Maybe she'll divorce me after a week."

"Maybe–" Huan started, but he was cut off by the stylist.

"There you go, sirs," he said with the air of a man desperate to be rid of them, "all ready."

"Spirits," groaned Baatar, eyes still shut.

"It actually looks rather good," offered Huan. He tapped Baatar on his shoulder with his glasses. Begrudgingly, Baatar put them on and stared at his new reflection. Huan had a point, loathe as he was to admit it.

"I think it brings out your cheekbones."

"Great," Baatar drawled. "The cheekbones that stopped a thousand wars."

Huan huffed a laugh. "You wish. But your new wife will probably think twice before kicking you out of bed for being an asshole."

 

* * *

 

Other parts of the wedding preparation did not end on a note as light as the one Huan had managed. The fitting for his wedding suit had gone poorly, in part to his mother's presence. Suyin could be rather tactless at the best of times, and to hear her rattle through the list of requirements for his suit—all those apparently _also_ set by his mysterious spouse to be—set his teeth on edge.

"Well, isn’t it great that green's her colour too," she said in an admiring tone as she held up a swath of cloth. "At least we don't have to change anything there, and it'll go beautifully with our silver boar."

"How lovely," Baatar said through gritted teeth, his neck straining behind the tight starched collar that his tailor was carefully pinning into place. "It's all green, I'll fit right in."

"Sweetheart," said his mother, with a pat on his arm that no longer felt as comforting as it used to. "Try to make the best of it."

"This is me making the best of it." An itch had settled on his nose, but with cloth now being pinned around his arms, he had to content himself with simply willing it away. "Why am I the one being made to conform to her requests? Don't I get to make a few too? What if I want her to wear yellow?"

"Don't be foolish, Junior," his mother muttered as she looked over two types of silk being held out to her by an assistant. "You'd have to match and you look terrible in yellow. It's not your colour."

"That's not my point, and you know it, mom."

Suyin sighed, long and deep. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. But unfortunately we had to make...rather more concessions when it came to the agreement. We may be an independent nation, but with the Earth Queen dead and the new...Empire taking the Earth Kingdom’s place, our position is somewhat precarious right now, you must understand."

"I understand that part, mother," Baatar said, still scrunching his nose furiously against the itch. "But why all of _this_." Still pinned into position, he gestured minutely at what he could: the three kinds of stiff green wool that had been laid out, the silks and brocade, his reflection in the mirror.

"You're getting married, Baatar." Suyin's tone was softly chiding. "You need to look your best. And I must say, she wasn't quite sold on you on the terms of your looks–"

" _Wow_ , thanks mom."

"You know I don't mean it that way."

"I hope dad wasn't there to hear you say that."

Suyin rolled her eyes, but didn't deign to comment on that. "She was rather interested to hear you are an engineer."

"Oh really?" asked Baatar sarcastically. He finally found his arms free, and gratefully scratched his nose. "I wonder why a power hungry militaristic warlord would be interested in my engineering skills. What if she wants me to develop weapons to be used against Zaofu?"

His mother's face took on a pinched look. "It should not come to that. That's the very reason we're doing this."

"So now I'm all that's standing between independence and invasion. Great, that's no pressure whatsoever." He pulled off his glasses, polishing them furiously on the hem of his robe. "I'll make sure not to disappoint in bed then."

"You'd better not," and it sounded like she was only half-joking as she said it.

"Mo-om!"

"If you could get her pregnant right away–"

Baatar almost fell off the stool. "What? I, I can't–"

"Don't act so scandalised," Suyin said scornfully. She waved a hand at the tailor, who bowed quickly first to her then Baatar before swiftly leaving the room. "You know this has nothing to do with your feelings whatsoever. This is all purely strategy and politics."

"I don't even know if I want to be a father," he hissed.

"I said this has nothing to do with your feelings," his mother snapped. "Did nothing I ever taught you go to your head?"

"It's one thing to be told something _might_ happen and another thing altogether to have to do it," he snarled back. "What if she doesn't want to get pregnant?"

Suyin waved a dismissive hand. "You'll find a way."

"No!" Baatar stepped off the stool and stalked up to his mother, unable and unwilling to suppress his feelings any more. "It's bad enough that you're marrying me off to a complete stranger, who, by the way, has previously threatened to _destroy_ Zaofu," he yelled. "And now you want me to be your puppet? Your agent? What about what _I_ want? _My_  ambitions, _my_ safety?"

"Spirits, Baatar, you are a member of the ruling family of Zaofu!" Suyin retorted. Though her son towered over her she remained unfazed, the look on her face disappointed, almost disdainful. "You will do what it takes to protect your people. Your privilege comes with a responsibility, as I have told you so many times.

"You _will_ marry this woman. You _will_ father a child with her. We will not be united by force, not while I am Matriarch of Zaofu, and you, even if you are my son, should know better than to speak to me in such a manner!" And she struck him across the face.

Baatar's hand flew to his reddened cheek as he gaped down at his mother. He couldn't recall the last time she'd slapped him, it had been so long ago.

"Screw you, mom," he said softly. "I'll marry this woman. I'll bed her and do whatever it takes to keep Zaofu safe. But I'm never going to be your tool of conquest."

"What, you think I don't know what you're aiming for?" he added, cutting Suyin off before she could respond. "I _did_ pay attention to your teachings. You play the long game. I know you're not just selling me off to her because it's convenient. But if you wanted someone to play by your rules, you should have chosen one of the twins. Or maybe Opal, though let’s be real, she probably won’t buy any of your bullshit either."

 

* * *

 

“You know, mom’s just looking out for you.”

Baatar shot her pointed look from under his arm. “Really, Opal?”

“I mean–” she kicked out with her foot, sending her chair into slow rotations "—being father to the heir of the empire will solidify your position.”

“Oh no, not you too.”

“I’m not saying you need to be happy about it,” his younger sister added.

“What if mom wanted _you_ to have babies for Zaofu?” he asked.

Opal sighed deeply, then rolled over to his desk. There, from the bottommost drawer, she pulled out a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. Baatar sat up, and watched as his sister poured herself two fingers of the amber liquor. He gestured for the bottle, raising it to his lips when it was handed to him, only to almost drop it when Opal tossed one of the heavy snifters into his lap.

“Opal!”

“Use a glass, you animal.”

“Ugh,” muttered Baatar, pouring himself a full glass. “I already feel married.”

He took a healthy sip, then gestured with his snifter in Opal’s direction. “You didn’t answer my question.”

She made a face at him, and took a healthy sip of her own.

“Oh.” Baatar’s heart sank. He’d been hoping better for Opal. His only sister and future Matriarch of Zaofu, clever, ambitious, responsible. And hopefully one day, a better ruler than his mother. “Mom already talked to you about this.”

“Well, at least I get to marry whomever I want,” said Opal, raising her glass in acknowledgement.

“She’s not going to make you have five children, right?”

“She’d better not,” Opal said darkly.

Baatar took another sip, staring morosely down into the amber liquid. “Maybe we should let the Empire invade. Ow!”

“You can’t say something like that!” Rolling up to him in her chair, Opal had jabbed her foot rather viciously into his ribs, making him spill some of his whiskey all over his stomach. “Besides, what makes you think she wouldn’t behead us all as political rivals?”

“Well, Huan’s become her number one fan, and you know how he gets about people. So she can’t be all that bad.”

“Huan likes theory. You know he sometimes forgets the world doesn’t function as performance art or a giant social experiment.”

“Huan would never let us be executed as performance art.”

“Are you so sure?” Opal said archly. “I think he might really get into it.” She flipped her bangs into her face, took a sip of her whiskey and spoke in a posh voice that did not sound like Huan at all.

“No, no, no, a little to the left. The fall of the axe must symbolize the futility of life, even as the connection of flesh and metal represents the return of the soul to the great elemental oneness, or,” she gestured widely with her glass, slopping some of it over the edge, “something-or-other. I don’t know how this works.”

“You clearly don’t,” Baatar said drily. “He’d say it’d be a statement on the obsolescence of the monarchy, which he would be right about, because that _is_ the Great Uniter’s actual goal.”

“So why is it an empire if she’s trying to abolish the monarchy?”

“Don’t ask me how that woman’s mind works,” he muttered.

“Hmmm,” said Opal thoughtfully, swirling her whiskey, then tipping it back in one swallow. She wiped her mouth. “I’ll guess you’ll find out soon enough.”

Baatar groaned loudly before draining his own glass.

As it did every day around this time, a loud creaking, groaning sound began echoing throughout the city. Even sprawled across his bed, Baatar could feel the ground tremble. He pushed himself to his feet, walking over to the window and peering out over the courtyard. Guards trooped past, their armour flashing in the fading sunlight, ready for the shift change. Cutting across the horizon, pointed edges of metal slowly started their creep inwards. Still clutching the bottle, Opal rolled over to him, joining him at the window.

“Will you ever take them down?” Baatar asked her, watching the petals draw dark shadows over the outlying buildings as they rose higher and higher.

Sucking in a breath through her teeth, Opal shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said. “I’d like to think so.”

On the giant plain that stretches before Zaofu’s valley, Baatar could see the specks that made up the Empire’s encampment. He wondered if his future wife was there, watching the domes go up and swearing to tear them down (or whatever it was that warlords did).

“Ugh,” moaned Opal, resting her head against the window sill. She looked a little sick, probably all that whiskey on an empty stomach. “At least you’re getting out of here. I’m probably going to die here.” And she pressed her forehead against his hip.

Baatar stroked a hand across her hair, resting it on her shoulder. Of all his siblings, he and Opal had been the closest, their relationship strengthened through the shared duties of being the eldest and the heir. He was going to miss her dearly.

Together they watched the sun set through the narrowing cracks of Zaofu’s closing petal domes.

 

* * *

 

The wedding was tomorrow. Baatar was going to get married tomorrow.

He rolled over in his bed, stomach churning. He hadn’t left his suite since the argument with his mother, but now he was aching to be out. Idiot, he scolded himself. What a waste of what might have been his final days in Zaofu.

His mother had tried to be subtle about it, but there was no way that he wasn’t going to notice the guards lurking about in the corridor outside. Or the fact that there were also two or more milling about in the courtyard at all times, especially the area right below his window. What did she think, that he was going to tie his bedsheets together and flee into the night? It would have been funny if hadn’t been quite so stupid, and also if it hadn’t actually crossed his mind once or twice.

For the past few hours he’d been going over all the plans for his engineering projects, sorting the ones he was hoping he’d be able to take along with him from the ones he didn’t want falling into the hands of the Empire (or his mother). Those he was going to give to Opal for safekeeping. But with that out of the way, he was left with twelve hours to kill before he was to be removed from his rooms again for his supposed big day. There was no more alcohol to be found, and the servants had been forbidden from bringing him more. Baatar wasn’t yet desperate enough to drink the rubbing alcohol he’d found under the bathroom sink. But if he wasn’t allowed to leave his chambers—not even to go down to his workshop—he would probably start considering it.

Baatar heard the main door open, but chose not to get up. It was probably his mother anyway, come to lecture him on the importance of duty, honour and loyalty. Or maybe his father, finally daring to show his face, probably with something to say about responsibility or love. He mashed his pillow over his face. He’d already decided he wasn’t going to listen to any of it.

“Oof!” A pillow smacked into his stomach with enough force to knock the wind out of him, and before he could regain it, it was followed by a heavy body.

“Is he moping?” Someone called from the common area.

“He’s moping!” his attacker bellowed, right next to Baatar’s ear. Strong brawny hands wrapped around Baatar’s ankles and he found himself dragged—sheets and all—out of bed. He hit the ground hard, barely managing to avoid smacking his hand on the bedframe and pulled the pillow from his face to glare at his two youngest brothers.

“What. The hell.”

“Look,” said Wei, bouncing on his toes. “The guards are distracted. Now’s your chance.”

“Fly!” cried Wing, making fluttering motions with his hands. “Like a bird.”

Baatar gaped. “You want me to run? What’s wrong?” A horrifying thought struck him. “Has the wedding been called off? Are we about to be invaded?”

“No,” the twins chorused in unison, as Baatar tried to free himself from the tangle of sheets.

“You know, you’ve just been hiding in here for the past three days,” said Wing.

“Two-and-a-half,” Wei corrected him.

“And mom wouldn’t let us throw you a bachelor party.”

Well, that was one thing his mother had done right. Baatar gave her a silent thank you. “So you’re here because…?” he asked warily. The twins’ plans, in the rare occasions they’d managed to wheedle, coerce or straight up blackmail him into joining them, had always ended in disaster. Usually a fire was involved, somewhere.

“We couldn’t bring the strippers to you, so we figured we’d bring you to the strippers!”

“What?”

“Actually,” Wei cut in, “we don’t have any strippers, you have to find them yourself.”

“ _What_.”

“The point being,” said Wing, finally finally cutting to the chase. “Go out. Opal and Huan are distracting the guards. You can use the exit through the kitchen. Go do...adult type bachelor party stuff.”

Baatar stared at the twins. He couldn’t believe it. His younger brothers—his _underage_ younger brothers—were trying to get him laid.

“Did Huan put you up to this?” he asked, squinting at them suspiciously.

“Actually it was dad–”

“ _What!_ ”

“He didn’t actually say that,” Wei added hastily, his exuberance fading visibly in the face of Baatar’s blatant confusion. “He just said we should make sure you didn’t mope all night.”

Baatar put his face in his hands. “And your thoughts immediately went to strippers?”

“Isn’t that how it goes?” asked Wing, sounding genuinely puzzled.

“I think I need to talk to mom about what kinds of movers you guys are allowed to watch.”

“Hey!” cried Wing. “I’m sixteen. I know how sex works!”

“Sure you do,” his twin ribbed him.

As they turned on each other with a flurry of insults, Baatar disentangled himself from the sheets and pushed himself to his feet. If the twins were right, this would indeed be his only chance, and probably his last, to see the city again. Without another word to his siblings, he headed for the door. The security guards weren’t stupid, even with Opal and Huan’s distractions, they’d probably be back on outside his door soon enough.

Baatar was almost out the door when something smacked into the back of his head. He stooped to pick it up, and straightened with a frown. “Do I want to know?” he asked, holding out the strip of condoms.

“Uh…” began Wei, in one of the rare moments where he was lost for words.

“No?” said Wing.

“I hate all of you,” Baatar muttered. But he pocketed them anyway. Who knew where the night would take him.

 

* * *

 

It took him to a bar in the seediest part of Zaofu—not that Zaofu got very seedy, not even in the outer domes—because every other part of the city made him jumpy. Too high of a chance of being recognized, even with the new haircut and after removing all markers from his clothing that identified him as a Beifong. He wasn’t the most popular member of his family, his work generally remaining rather low-key compared to some of his brothers’ accomplishments, but Baatar didn’t dare risk it regardless.

There were no strippers in the bar, which Baatar found a bit of a relief, but the beer was good, and the rest of the clientele seemed reasonably attractive, should it actually come to that. At the moment however, Baatar found that his bigger priority was getting comfortably drunk, so immediately after his first round he ordered another, and then a third. By the time he drained that third glass, warmth was slowly spreading through him, easing the tension in his shoulders and allowing him to relax for the first time for what felt in _days_.

Feeling loose and rather confident now, Baatar spun around in his seat. There were two women at a corner table, and from the way their eyes occasionally roamed the room and they giggled as they talked to each other in low voices, they probably wouldn’t object if he joined them and bought them drinks. Then there was the guy at the other end of the bar, who kept flicking rather unsubtle glances over to him. He felt like he could go either way tonight, but first he had to take a leak.

Minutes later, washing his hands at the tiny sink at the back of the bar, Baatar suddenly found himself knocked forward as two people passed him in the narrow corridor. He scowled, but decided to pay it no heed, unwilling to let two idiots ruin the evening for him. Until he heard one of them speak.

“Stop following me.” A woman’s voice. Angry, from the sound of it.

“Look sweetheart, just give me–” The man was cut off by the sound of a thud, and his sentence trailed off in a gasping wheeze.

Well, thought Baatar. That seemed to be handled. No need for him to step in. He pressed himself against the wall as the woman stormed back down to the front of the bar. He followed sedately, putting all thought of the confrontation he’d overheard out of his mind, his thoughts turning to how he was going to approach the guy–

“What happened to Chong?”

“You friend had rather too much to drink.” It was that woman’s voice again, dry, warning. She had taken a seat at the bar, and a group of three men were slowly clustering around her. Through the gaps in between their bodies, Baatar saw that the other man at the bar had left. Damn.

“Don’t think so,” said one of the leering men. He had a slimy look about him, which with his size made him somewhat reminiscent of a toad. “He can hold his drink.”

Baatar stepped forward, but the bartender was already intervening. “Leave,” he said, fixing a steely glare on the three men. “Or I’ll call the police.”

“Fine.” Slimy jerked his head at one of his friends. “Van, go get Chong.” He backed away, but not before making rude kissing noises at the woman they’d been harassing. She ignored them, taking a long draught of her drink.

Baatar slipped past them to the safety of the other end of the bar, where he could get another drink and reconsider his prospects when a shout rang out from the back. “Holy shit! She knifed him in the balls!”

“Oops.” It was said softly enough that Baatar was pretty sure only he could hear her, but when he glanced over, the woman looked anything but regretful. As the men rounded on her again, she quickly knocked back the rest of her drink and rose to her feet. Across the room, mugs and glasses where hurriedly set down and chairs scraped across the floor as all of the other patrons left the premises, unwilling to get caught up in the brewing fight. This, unfortunately, also included the two women from the corner table. Baatar briefly considered following them out, but his sense of honour (and some deeper restless urge) bade him to stay.

“You should take your friend to the hospital.” The woman had a strong clear voice that reverberated around the near empty bar. The authority in it was unmistakable. “We don’t have to fight.”

“No, you really don’t,” added the bartender. He held a phone in one hand and stout wooden stave in the other. “I’ve called the police. All of you clear out. That includes you, madam,” he inclined his head at her, “and _you_.” Baatar suddenly found himself on the receiving end of the other man’s glare, like he’d been the one to start all this.

“All right, all right,” he said amicably, putting his hands up. “We’ll go. Come on,” he said, beckoning to the group of men, hoping to appeal to their better natures. “I can tell you where the hospital is.”

“Fuck off,” snarled the slimy-looking one, the one who’d been previously leering at the woman.

“Actually–”

For a man his size, Slimy moved quickly. The blow knocked Baatar backwards into the bar. He managed to catch himself in time, only to throw himself to the floor seconds later anyway in order to dodge the second punch aimed at his face. His head rang. Warm blood trickled from his nose, tickling his upper lip.

“What the–” he gasped, scrambling away from the man bearing down on him. “I didn’t–”

A chair smashed across his attacker’s back, sending the other man toppling to the floor. Baatar quickly rolled out of the way and pulled himself to his feet.

“Uh, thanks,” he muttered, swiping the back of his hand across his nose to stem the flow of blood.

“Not a problem,” said the woman casually, though there was a wild gleam in her eyes. With equal nonchalance, she whipped around to strike one of the other men in the face with the leg of the chair she’d broken. Chong, who was still lying on the floor, briefly regained enough consciousness to yell “Get them!” That seemed to galvanise the third man, Van, into action, and he threw himself on the woman with a roar. Pulling off his glasses and tucking them away, Baatar moved to aid her when he noticed his attacker climbing to his feet.

“Shit.” Lunging over the bar, he grabbed the first bottle within reach, and smashed it over the man’s head. That sent him to the ground again, but now the second man—the bald one who’d been hit with the chair—was stirring.

“Just stay down,” Baatar muttered, aiming a kick at his face. Too slow. The man grabbed his boot and pulled him down to the floor with him. Realising with growing horror that being on the ground with a man twice his size and weight wasn’t going to end well for him, Baatar kicked out wildly, desperate to break the man’s grip, while his arms flailed about, reaching for the closest thing to grab. His hands closed around the leg of a barstool and pulled. Lousy leverage from the floor, but he managed to make the heavy wooden seat land on the man’s head, and he felt the grip around his ankle loosen.

Back on his feet, he scanned the room. The third guy, for all his slowness, seemed to be a better and more sober fighter than his peers, and was putting up a good defense against the woman’s flurry of blows. As Baatar watched, she managed strike him across the face, sending him reeling. Baatar found himself quietly hissing a “Yes!”, hands curling in shared triumph, but apparently he'd rejoiced too soon. Van recovered quickly, far quicker than even the woman seemed to have anticipated. He struck her across the face, and as she stumbled back, he grabbed her and threw her across the bar. She smashed into the wall of bottles, sending glass and alcohol everywhere.

“Well, fuck,” Baatar muttered. He kicked the two he’d been struggling with again for good measure before flinging himself over the bartop. Behind the bar, the woman lay on the ground, covered in glass, looking dazed. The bartender was nowhere to be seen.

Grabbing her by the arm, Baatar hauled her to her feet, reaching for one of the few intact bottles he could find with his free hand. Dragging her along, he made for bar's exit, the one closest to the back exit. The third guy, Van, the last one standing, rushed them, and Baatar braced for another blow, drawing back his arm with the bottle to defend himself.

It never landed.

"Fuck you both," the guy muttered, standing still in the middle of the room, his arm slowly falling to his side. His gaze moved from Baatar and the woman, to his companions. Former companions, from the looks of it now. "Fuck you too," he said to the unconscious Chong and spat on the floor. And with ever growing confusion and relief, Baatar watched him stomp out the door.

A low groaning from the woman brought him back to his senses, that, and the nearing sound of sirens. Absolutely determined not to spend the rest of the night in a police lockup, Baatar hurried for the exit. They crashed through the door into a dingy alley, and the cool air immediately roused Baatar’s companion to full alertness. Upon hearing the approaching sirens, she seized him by the wrist, this time being the one to drag him along.

“You know where we’re going, right?” Baatar asked, looking over his shoulder to make sure they weren’t being pursued.

“I have a very good sense of direction,” said the woman, as she led him to the end of the alley, then turned down into a side street. Baatar spent several minutes squinting after her in the grey gloom of the night until he remembered glasses he’d tucked away. He reached into his shirt, only to find himself pulling out a mangled mess of wire and cracked glass. He swore silently under his breath, trying to remember when exactly he’d taken a blow that could have destroyed them. Not that it mattered now. They were useless, and he tossed the glasses into a nearby dumpster as they hurried past.

Another twist, another turn, another mad dash down an alley. Thanks to the dome, the sound of the sirens never fully faded, though at some point they cut out in order to not wake the entire city sector. By then Baatar and his mysterious companion found themselves at a park at the edge of the city, pausing a moment to reorientate themselves and catch their breaths.

“You think they’ll come looking for us?” Baatar’s companion asked, brushing her hair back from her face. Their run through the city sector made her look rather windswept, and Baatar found himself watching absently as she tried to smooth it back, picking the occasional shard of glass out of the dark strands. Some of them caught the light from the streetlights, shining like stars in her hair.

“I asked you a question.”

He started, tearing his eyes away and hoping she couldn’t see him flush. “I don’t think so,” he said slowly, recalling her query. “They’ll probably arrest the men and leave it at that. They might put out an APB…” Especially if his mother had discovered his temporary flight. He prayed that the police didn’t escalate the incident up to her.

“We’ll find out soon enough if they have. Our security force is very efficient.”

“Great,” she huffed. After casting another look down the empty street, she strode into the park like she owned it. Baatar gave it a second’s thought, then followed.

“Where are you headed?”

“I think I’ll spend the night here.”

He raised an eyebrow. “In a park?”

She grimaced. “I had a room above the bar. Can’t go back now, can I? Are you going to open that?”

“Huh, what?” asked Baatar, then realised she meant the bottle in his hand. He’d completely forgotten grabbing it, and had somehow kept hold of it throughout their escape. He inspected the label. “It’s yellow wine. I don’t think it’s very good.”

“Does it matter?”

She had a point there, Baatar had to admit. While he couldn’t speak for her, at this point he was on the run from the law _and_ his mother (who was technically the law too), had gotten into a bar fight, broken his glasses and maybe his nose, and was now hanging out in a park with violent stranger. Bad booze was the least of his worries.

Withdrawing the cork, he took a healthy swig of the wine. It tasted faintly herbal, though it ended up being stronger than expected, burning a path down his throat.

“Great, now he hogs it all,” he heard his companion mutter to herself, before she snatched the bottle from his hands. By the time she’d drunk her fill, almost half the wine was gone. By then they’d wandered to the very edges of the park, where the trees started brushing up against the curving domes. Still holding on to the bottle, the woman threw herself down onto the ground, tucking one of her hands behind her head.

“How do you live like this?” she muttered, staring up at Zaofu’s metallic night sky. “No stars, no sun.”

“The domes do go down during the day,” Baatar said curtly, sitting down next to her in the damp grass. “We don’t spend all our time hidden from the world.”

She turned to him, gaze thoughtful. “You don’t sound too enthused about them.”

“They serve a purpose,” he said evasively, reluctant to expand on his exact opinions on Zaofu’s defenses with someone who was quite clearly a stranger to the city-state.

“Hmmm.” She took another swig from the bottle before passing it over to him. Baatar drank.

“So what brings you to Zaofu?”

“Business.”

“What kind of business?”

“Metallurgy.”

“Right,” said Baatar, not quite believing her. “So what brought you to our fine establishment back there? I don’t suppose part of your business involved knifing a man in the balls and starting a bar fight?”

She gave him a sharp-toothed grin. “That was the pleasure bit.”

Baatar had to laugh at that. Raising the bottle to her in toast, he drank and passed it back.

“What about you?” she asked, swirling the bottle around.

“Nothing as exciting.”

“Well, clearly something brought you there. I’m pretty sure no one visits that place for their excellent drinks.”

“You’re nosy,” Baatar muttered under his breath. Common sense demanded he leave it at that, but under the combined influence of alcohol and lingering adrenaline, common sense wasn’t all there. So he said, “I was trying to get laid,” without shame, and made a face at her, making clear where he was laying the blame for the turn his night had taken.

“Oh,” she said, looking taken aback for a moment by his bluntness, before she had to turn away and cough. The cough quickly turned into poorly disguised laughter, and Baatar’s scowl deepened as her voice rang out through the trees, magnified by the closeness of the metal.

“Be quiet,” he hissed, grabbing her wrist. “Or do you want the police to find us after all?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, wiping her eyes, still chuckling to herself. “For ruining your night.”

Baatar groaned. Belated embarrassment was starting to set in, and he grabbed the bottle from her, drinking deeply to cover it up.

“If it makes you feel any better,” and now some awkwardness was seeping into her voice too, “I kind of had the same goal, only to encounter jerks who can’t take no for an answer. The knifing and bar fight...” She shrugged. “Shit happens.”

“Well, lucky you, you ended up having a good time anyway.”

Another grin, this one not quite as wild. “I did,” she said, and sounded rather wistful about it. “Haven’t had a good bar fight in ages.”

Not knowing quite how to respond to that or her tone, Baatar took another drink.

“Do I still get some too, or are you going to finish that?”

Baatar raised the bottle to his face, squinting at what was left of it before passing it over. “You can finish it.”

“Oh, how generous,” she snarked when she saw how much was left.

“You had your chance earlier.”

She huffed, and tipped her head back to finish the last few dregs of the wine, and Baatar suddenly found his gaze caught by the pale column of her throat as she swallowed.

He quickly tore away his eyes when she pulled back the now empty bottle and recorked it, throwing among the roots of the nearest tree.

“You shouldn’t–”

“Relax,” she said, sitting up and carding her hand through her hair. “I’m not littering, I just don’t want it getting in the way.”

“In the way of what?” Baatar wanted to ask, but found himself at a loss for words when he was suddenly pushed back into the grass by a firm hand. Mystery woman loomed over him, her hair falling into her face. She leaned forward, close enough that even in the dark without his glasses, Baatar could see that her eyes were very, very green.

“Um…” He licked his lips, noticing how that made her eyes immediately dart to his mouth. Well, screw it, Baatar thought then, giving into the desire that had been coiling tighter in his belly for most of the night. He surged up even as she dipped down, and their lips met in a messy clash, noses bumping and teeth clacking together. His bruised nose protested at the treatment, and the tang of metal made him remember that he was probably still a little bloody, but she didn’t seem to care.

“You Zaofu-ans,” she muttered, fumbling around his hips searching for the hem of his tunic. “So many layers.”

“Says you,” he retorted, pulling back to start on the many buttons of her blouse. He gave up halfway, pushing the fabric off her shoulders and she briefly let go of him to pull her arms out of her sleeves. Baatar took the moment to divest himself of his tunic, squirming slightly when she pushed him back again into cool, damp grass.

He felt lightheaded, probably a combination of alcohol and lust. A little voice at the back of his head worried about propriety, about drawing attention, but he viciously squelched it. His mother hadn't raised him to go about fucking strange women in public parks, but considering she’d also done very little to prepare him for being married off to a random stranger, Baatar thought, screw propriety. He pushed his hand into the woman's unlaced breeches, past her underwear and found her already wet and wanting. He slipped a finger into her and she groaned into his mouth, her hips bucking against his hand. Encouraged, he slipped in another and curled them, and to his gratification, it seemed to work: her breath hitched, and she clenched around his fingers, soft and warm and wet. "Spirits," she moaned, grinding down against his hand. "I need you to fuck me now."

Her hands were already fumbling his belt and pants open, and he caught the white flash of her teeth as she grinned at what she found. "Nice."

"Um, thanks."

"You have a condom?"

Baatar fumbled one of the foil packets from his pocket, which she snatched from his hand and ripped open with her teeth. Her touch was quick and clinical as she rolled it on, and she took him into her with a groan that arched her back and put her breasts within perfect reach.

As she began to roll her hips, he slid his hands down, fitting his thumbs over the jut of her hip bones. Planted his feet so he could better thrust upward into her slick, tight heat. She ground against him with every downward roll of her hips and he remembered himself enough to reach between their sweaty bodies and stroke his thumb over her clit.

She came first because he made sure he did, because halfway through chasing his pleasure he realised he wanted to see her fall apart, see that strange wildness again in her eyes again. Of course then she had to go bury her face in his neck, moaning low and gnawing his bare shoulder, and it was probably the scrape of her teeth that triggered his own orgasm. He pulled her tight against him as he came, fisting one hand in her thick, dark hair, as the other clenched on her hip. She smelled very strongly of booze.

Still panting softly, she rolled off him. Her blouse had become entangled around her waist; she unbuttoned the rest of it and tossed it aside. As Baatar carefully sat up and removed the condom, she propped herself up on one elbow, watching him with a smirk on her face.

“Don’t look so pleased with yourself,” he muttered.

“Hey, we both got what we wanted.” Raising her arms above her head, she stretched, once again drawing his eye to her long lean shape, the curve of her breasts, the taut plane of her stomach. She had a scar, he noted curiously, new enough that it stood out pink against her skin, roping its way down her right thigh.

“What happened?” he asked, reaching out, then hesitating.

“What, this?” She casually threw her leg over his hip, tracing the path of the scar. “I’d like to say I got it in a fight, but actually I fell off the back of a truck.”

Baatar stared at her. He still couldn’t tell if she was joking, but considering that a joke would, as she’d said, actually have been about a fight, he figured there was some truth to it. Still, she wasn’t like any metallurgist, or business woman he’d ever known. And as an engineer he knew quite a few of them.

“Your turn,” she said, and tapped a spot on his chest, right above his left nipple. He had a small pale scar there, an old one from childhood. “What happened there?”

“I’d like to say I was beset upon by a wild beast,” he began drily, “but it was actually my sister’s pet rabbaroo.”

She laugh-coughed again, brushing up against him as she shook with mirth, and Baatar found himself wishing that the night would never end. Not that he expected anything to come out of a dalliance with a complete stranger, but the thought of the coming morning made him all the more desperate for the night to stretch on.

The scratch of her nails against his chest pulled him out of his self pitying thoughts. His pants, bunched up under his knees, were beginning to get uncomfortable, so he kicked them off. In the process, the rest of the condoms fell out of his pocket. Mystery woman immediately pounced on them, a gleam in her eye.

“Hmmm,” she purred, leaning into him, “looks like you came prepared.”

Baatar felt himself stir with renewed interest, and he ran his hand up the thigh she still had resting on him, tracing a path up between her legs.

“So,” she said, a self-satisfied smile playing about her lips. “How do you feel about round two?”

 

* * *

 

It was the groan of the domes opening that woke him, but it was the realisation of his nakedness that shocked Baatar into full alertness. Scrambling for his clothes, he pulled them on, realising only when he was shrugging on his tunic that he was alone. Mystery woman was gone, not a trace of her presence left, not even the empty bottle or the condom wrappers.

Baatar ignored the strange swooping sensation in his chest. At least she’d spared them both the awkward goodbyes.

He encountered no one stumbling out of the park, but he got more than a few suspicious looks as he walked out into the street. The lowering of the domes marked the start of the day for most citizens of Zaofu, and it wouldn’t be long before the streets were full of people headed for work or to school.

Baatar was just about to slip onto one of the trains headed for the upper city when an arm closed over his shoulder. It was a very familiar grip, one he had grown up with over the years.

“Aiwei.”

“Your mother has been worried sick about you.”

Barely suppressing a groan, Baatar spun around to face the older man. Aiwei was his mother’s most trusted advisor, and while Baatar had always found the man strange, if not a little creepy, the man did his job well.

“Do I want to know if you were spying on me all of last night?” he asked, as he was led away from the train. To his embarrassment, a troop of palace guards was waiting at the entrance, and he shot a glare over to Aiwei. No doubt a move calculated to humiliate him in punishment for running off.

“As a matter of fact, I was only alerted to you disappearance this morning,” Aiwei said blandly. “Not that it takes much imagination to figure out what you were up to.” He looked askance at the state of Baatar’s clothes, grass stained, still damp with dew in places. Baatar tried to catch his reflection in one of the windows, then decided against. He didn’t really want to know how much of a mess he looked right now.

The guards and Aiwei escorted him past the station, down to what looked like an empty office nearby, but which Baatar knew to be the secret entrance for the express train that would take them directly to the upper dome.

“You’re just going to lead me straight to the chopping block, huh?” Baatar joked lamely as he was hustled into the compact cabin of the express train. It was large enough to hold ten people and could function both with and without an operator at the head. If Baatar knew any part of the city intimately from the inside out, it was this shuttle and the deep tunnel it ran through. He’d designed it after all, in a collaborative effort with his father.

Aiwei meanwhile chose not to dignify him with an answer, and they spent the duration of their brief ride in an uncomfortable silence. By the time they arrived at the estate’s underground station, Baatar was more than eager to be delivered into the smothering arms of his mother.

The twins, however, had beat Suyin to it.

"Where have you been?” Wei yelled. “Mom's going crazy, she thinks you've been kidnapped or worse, run away!"

"In that order?" Baatar observed sardonically. "Well no need for panic, I'm here."

It was Wing however who elbowed his twin aside to ask the important question. “So, did you…?” He waggled his eyebrows at his older brother.

“Fuck off,” Baatar muttered, putting his hand over Wing’s face and pushing him away. That however seemed to serve as enough confirmation for the two, because they _ooh_ ed, high-fived each other, than dashed off, whooping all the way and almost running over their mother who had just gotten out of the elevator.

"Junior!" she called out when she spotted him, running forward to meet him. "Oh thank goodness you're here, I was beginning to think you'd been kidnapped! Or worse, run away! But you wouldn't do that to your poor mother, would you?"

"No," Baatar sighed, "I would never, mother."

She put a hand to his face, looking horrified as she tilted his head this way and that. “Spirits, what happened to you?”

“Is it really that bad?” he asked, feeling carefully along the bridge of his nose. It still felt slightly tender to the touch, but it didn’t feel broken.

“There’s blood on your face, Junior!” exclaimed his mother. “Now come on! You’re lucky you only have two hours to get ready for your meeting with the Great Uniter, or you’d be in a lot of trouble!”

Rolling his eyes, Baatar went with her.

For the next one-and-a-half hours, Baatar found himself scrubbed and shaved, groomed and dressed until he felt like little more than a very expensive porcelain doll. The blood had ended up not being as terrible as Suyin had made it out to be (which made sense, otherwise mystery woman would never have kissed him), and the bruise around his nose was easily covered in make-up. From his large collection of spares, he’d retrieved a new pair of glasses, these with darker, more fashionable frames.

By the time he was marched back down to the reception hall, he was, as his mother put it, “Finally presentable, like an actual prince,” though she still fussed around with his collar an inordinate amount, until the hidden door behind the large Beifong seal opened and his father slipped into the room, mumbling his apologies to his wife. Baatar he gave a fond squeeze on the shoulder, before he took his place at his wife’s right.

The reception hall wasn’t quite a throne room, though Suyin had made sure her seat at the high table was on a raised dais, all the better to observe the people she surrounded herself with. Depending on the audience she was holding, the seats where usually filled by advisors, city governors, or family. Today Baatar found himself seated on her left at the high table. There were no advisors in attendance in today besides Aiwei, who at some quiet sign rose to his feet and announced the arrival of the Great Uniter. Baatar’s future wife.

Baatar swallowed, feeling slightly faint. He wasn’t ready for this.

Suyin gave Aiwei a nod, and the heavy doors opened. Baatar sat up straight, hoping to present as dignified of an image as he could muster, as well as to better see this mysterious Great Uniter who was going to be his wife.

A troop of five soldiers (a better term did not come to Baatar immediately, and they all _did_ look like soldiers) marched in, all dressed in a green uniform. Huan had been right, he noted, all the men had an identical haircut, shorn at the sides, slicked tightly back on the top. There were two women in the group, both with their hair pulled back into buns, and the woman at the head of the group struck Baatar as somewhat familiar. This was probably her. The Great Uniter.

They marched down the length of the deliberately long hall, coming to a halt at the foot of the dais. Clearly none of them thought much of Suyin’s power play, and faint sneer curled the lip of the Great Uniter as her gaze travelled down the length of the table.

Then her eyes met Baatar’s and the sneer died on her lips. An icy shock ran down his spine. It was the woman from the park. Her hair was up, and she’d grown a beauty mark under her right eye, but the distinctive eyebrows were unmistakable, and even last night, without his glasses, those green eyes had stood out.

“Presenting Gu Wei La, The Great Uniter, Lord Commander of the Earth Army, Head of the Council of Five, and Overseer of the Earth Empire.”

“Overseer?” Baatar mouthed to himself, gaze still locked with hers. She noticed, and her eyes narrowed.

“Lady Suyin–”

“Matriarch,” Suyin cut in coldly. The Great Uniter’s eyes immediately left Baatar’s, flicking over to his mother as the two women sized each other up. Of course, when it came down to it, it was all about them, a power play between two leaders. He was nothing but a pawn in their game. Baatar let out a breath he hadn’t realised he was holding, and pulled off his glasses to polish them on his tunic. The heavy brocade however didn’t lend itself well to the task, and by the time he looked up, the two women had ended whatever staring contest they’d been having and were looking at him expectantly.

“Yes?” he ventured, pushing his glasses back on his face.

Gu Wei La—if he was going to be married to her he had to stop thinking of her as the Great Uniter, what a ridiculous title anyway—cleared her throat. “I am requesting a moment with my future spouse, Baatar Beifong the Second. If we are to be wed, it would benefit us both some time to...get to know each other.”

Despite the gravity of the situation and the tense mood in the hall, Baatar had to pinch himself to keep from chuckling at the way she’d put it. In some ways, they’d gotten to know each other very well last night.

“I must unfortunately decline your request–” Suyin began, probably about to use propriety and tradition to head her off, but Baatar rose to his feet, the screech of the heavy teak chair cutting across her words and echoing through the hall.

“Okay,” he said, and stepped off the dais. “Follow me.”

He didn’t turn to look if she was following, because that meant looking back to see his mother apoplectic with rage, or his father’s concerned, disappointed face. Besides, if his wife-to-be wanted to stab him in the back, it would probably go quicker for him if he didn’t see it coming.

There was a small chamber of the side of the hall, usually used to house additional guards for any goings-on in the hall. It was rather surprisingly empty, but that suited Baatar’s purpose just fine. He wanted to talk to her alone, and here he knew exactly where the bugs were.

And Gu Wei La, no surprise there, was no idiot. She watched him intently as he pulled back the hidden panel that disabled all of his mother’s listening devices, and then pulled out a device of his own creation that interfered with the ones he didn’t know about. When he was sure they were alone, he gave her a nod.

If he’d expected any kind of gratitude, he was immediately proven wrong. Grabbing him by the high collar of his tunic, she slammed him up against the wall. Baatar struggled, trying to break free of her grip, only to freeze when he felt the sharp cool line of a knife settle under his chin. Clearly his mother’s guards hadn’t been as careful as they’d been trained to be. Or his future wife was sneakier than even his mother.

“What kind of game are you playing at?” she snarled.

“No game!” Baatar wheezed, trying to suck in a breath, made all the harder by her weight on his chest. “No game! For fuck’s sake, let me breath!”

She took a step back, letting up on the pressure, but the blade at his throat never wavered. Baatar had no doubt that this was the very same knife that had gotten intimately acquainted with poor Chong’s balls the night before.

“You know, if you’re going to kill me, my mother will make sure you never leave Zaofu alive.”

“I’d like to see her try,” she sneered.

Eyeing the knife, Baatar tried to siddle over to a line of benches built around the room. The lack of sleep from last night was slowly getting to him, and he wanted to sit down. “Wei La—is it alright if I call you that?—can you–”

“You can call me Kuvira,” she said, voice testy. “I prefer it.”

“Kuvira, then,” he said, testing the name out in his mouth. It was, for all the complexity and ridiculousness of the current situation, nice to finally put a name to her face. “Can you please put away the knife? I know where it’s been.”

A short bark of laughter left her. It must have escaped her control, because she scowled fiercely right after. But much to Baatar’s relief, she took away the knife, tucking it away somewhere up her sleeve. He scooted away, rubbing his neck, and sat down.

“So…” he began. “We could just pretend nothing ever happened.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” She folded her hands behind her back and started pacing. “You tell me this isn’t a game, and yet I am supposed to believe you had no idea who I was?”

“Well, you didn’t seem to recognise me either,” he retorted. “At least I have the excuse of poor eyesight. What’s yours, brain-rotting horniness?”

She stopped in the middle of her pacing to shoot him a vicious glare. “The portrait your mother sent us was woefully out of date.”

Baatar’s stomach sank. “Was it the one with the giant Beifong seal?”

“The ridiculously huge one made to give the illusion that you had wings? Yes.”

“Oh spirits,” he moaned, dropping his face in his hands. “And you actually agreed to marry me after seeing that? _I_ wouldn’t marry me based on that portrait.”

“Maybe that was your mother’s hope,” Kuvira mused. “Not that it matters anyway. Appearances are secondary.”

“Good to know,” Baatar muttered.

“You still haven’t answered my question.”

“That I didn’t know who you were? Look at you!” He threw up his hands, gesturing at her, the hair, the uniform, the way she stood at parade rest, a complete one-eighty from the woman he’d met the night before. “Why would it ever occur to me that you’d be running around in Zaofu screwing strangers and starting bar fights?”

Something suddenly occurred to him. “How _did_ you get into Zaofu, anyway?”

Her lips compressed into a thin line. “That does not matter.”

“Of course it matters!” he snapped. “This is the security of Zaofu that we’re talking about! What good is it marrying you to maintain our autonomy when you can traipse in and out at will?” He rose, drawing himself to his full height. It gave him several inches over her, and while she didn’t back down, meeting his glare with a cold steely gaze of her own, it made him feel better that she had to tilt her head back to do so.

“Tell me, and I’ll pass it off as a security flaw,” he demanded. “Your entrance into the city without my mother’s knowledge violates the terms of your treaty and would render this arrangement null and void. You’ve come all this way, camped outside Zaofu for almost a month, and then agreed to marry me based on a portrait taken when I was eighteen. Clearly you need something from us. Tell me.”

Her eyes narrowed to slits, and for several terrifying seconds Baatar was sure the knife was going to come out again, that he was about to meet the same fate as Chong. Then she turned away, crossing to the other side of the room. “The sewer mains.”

“Oh, wow,” said Baatar, raising an eyebrow, even as he made a mental note to have his father run an inspection on the mains at once. “You must have been really desperate.”

Kuvira flushed, folding her arms defensively, and it was that gesture that softened her a little, made her look somewhat more like the person she’d been last night.

Baatar lowered himself back on the bench and steepled his fingers under his chin. “So are we still doing this? Getting married?”

“Yes,” said Kuvira, with no hesitation. “Nothing has changed in that regard.”

Baatar regarded her over his glasses. Leaning against the wall, her arms still crossed, rigid posture loosened, she looked like any other soldier off duty. Tired. Contemplative.

“What are you getting from Zaofu? Why have you arranged this?”

She looked up at him, eyes widening slightly. “I’m surprised you do not know. You’re the one marrying me, how can you remain so ignorant about the circumstances?”

Baatar laughed softly. “You overestimate how much power I have here. My mother plays her cards close to her chest, and I am not her heir. If you were hoping to somehow gain a foothold here through me then, sorry.” He shrugged. “I’ll have to disappoint.”

“Yes, I know,” she said. Her hand rose to her head, like she was about to card her hand through her hair. Then she seemed to remember then that it wasn’t loose, and her hand fell back to her side, where it clenched into a fist. “I initially tried to arrange to marry your sister, but the Matriarch was adamant that that was off the table.”

“Yeah,” said Baatar. “That was never going to happen.” He noticed that she hadn’t answered his question, but no matter. If this marriage was going to happen regardless, then he was going to find out soon enough. He’d make sure of it.

“We should better go back out,” he said. “Or we’ll soon have soldiers knocking down the door.”

He rose to his feet, offering Kuvira his elbow. After a second’s hesitation, she crossed the room and took it.

Upon opening the door, he was forced to backpedal immediately at the sight of a dozen or so soldiers and guards bearing down on them. Beside him, he felt Kuvira tense, but before the knife came out again, his mother’s ringing command brought them to a halt.

“What’s going on?” she demanded, robes flapping as she hurried from the dais. “What happened?”

“Nothing,” said Baatar, exchanging a look with his wife-to-be. “Just...getting to know each other a little better.”

**Author's Note:**

> If this reads like a tropey mctropefest of arranged marriage fic cliches...it is. It's one of my fandom weaknesses, and I regret nothing. XD
> 
> Re the line on Huan's sexuality, I made him ace. And yes, Baatar's bi, as is Kuvira.
> 
> There'll be a part two for this, with the whole tea ceremony and wedding shebang from Kuvira's POV.


End file.
